I’ve been tilting at this windmill for a while now. At first on SFist back about 2007 or so and then on this tiny blog. The first TJ’s shopper death came a few years back. The next will come tomorrow or next year or in another five years, something like that.

What’s that, the speed limit here is 25 MPH and cars come through “speeding” all the time? Well, not really. Average speed for southbound traffic is fairly low. And for northbound, it’s not all that fast either. And oh, the limit on this stretch of Masonic is 30 MPH.

What’s that, Planning and DPW and the all-knowing, all-seeing SFMTA have a plan for Masonic and it’s coming soon? Well, not really. The project wasn’t as “shovel-ready as promised so they’ve loaned the Masonic-designated pork for other stuff. A “new” Masonic will eventually come, but not above Geary and TJ’s and all the photos you can see are all from north of Geary.

Who created this problem? SFGOV, including the Planning Department, for starters.

Who can do a better job of fixing things? SFGOV, including the SFMTA, for starters. And IDK, SFPD and DPW? And Trader Joe’s as well.

Here’s a recent example, just a couple of Bros on the west side of Masonic wanting to get to a parked car on the east side, just above the SFMTA’s Presidio Yard. (Note that they might not even be TJ’s customers, but their transit across four lanes of traffic is at the same place where shoppers do it.)

All these southbound cars have stopped for the red light at Geary. So far, so good:

But uh oh, cars are now coming up from Geary in the northbound lanes – it’s time to rethink and try again later:

Or, in this case, spend 2.5 minutes going down the hill to Geary, wait for the green light, and then ascend back up Masonic.

This is the choice people face. Sometimes they err and get hit by a car.

This is typical, this is routine – people parking on Masonic northbound and then jaywalking across five lanes of traffic to get to Trader Joe’s #100 and then jaywalking again back to their rides

Why do people do this? Well, ’cause getting from northbound Masonic to southbound, which is the only way to get into the parking lot, is a PITA. Drivers are banned from simply turning left into the parking lot because that would end up blocking half of northbound Masonic, and of course Masonic is the Great Connector betwixt The Avenues and the Place Where People Want To Be.

And even if you get yourself facing southbound, you still have to queue up to get into TJ’s ridiculously small parking lot. Hey, couldn’t they have built an underground garage? Well, sure, but you’d have to talk with the Planning Department about that. And hey, couldn’t they have built parking on the roof? Well, sure, and actually they did but you’d have to talk with the Planning Department about that because the average shopper isn’t allowed to park on the roof.

And actually, the current parking situation is better than before. Our vaunted Planning Department did a very poor job with this project and now we’re left with a kludgy fix that commits part of Masonic to TJ’s shoppers idling and parking and waiting.

So that’s the situation, that’s why people say I-don’t-wanna-deal-with-all-that and simply park on northbound Masonic on the east side of the street.

And that’s fine, that’s legal, but then the shoppers see that northbound Masonic has long stretches when it’s empty (because drivers need to wait at a red for a long time to let traffic on Geary go through) and they see a bunch of stalled traffic on southbound Masonic (because of the shoppers queuing up and also to wait at a red for a long time to let traffic on Geary go through). So they march across 30 MPH Masonic to get to the store.

How many TJs shoppers do this on a busy day? IDK, hundreds. It’s their thing, it’s their routine.

So can you die doing this? Sure. Does TJ’s know about this situation? Sure. I don’t see how they couldn’t be aware. I mean, when you have journalists calling up your store asking about how somebody died, I assume that you’re aware of the situation.

What’s the solution? Well, people’d be safer walking down to Geary and crossing legally, but they all already know that.

You see the problem is that they don’t know how dangerous it is to do what they’re doing.

Hey, you know how many people die at Ocean Beach during a typical year? A lot. So many theat they have a special sign:

I don’t know when this UC “campus” got built, but just look at what was in fashion back in the day:

Huge empty lawns and huge empty driveways that never get used. What were they thinking? Were these lawns a “gift” to the people of San Francisco? Were they something we wanted or appreciated paying for? IDK.

I could see this place out in the country where there’s plenty of space, but I don’t know what it’s doing in SF.

Anyway, we’ll be enjoying this campus as we walk, ride, and drive by for the next half-decade, it looks like.

You see this sign? It’s the one you see as you exit TJ’s #100 on Masonic near Geary, assuming you’re not driving or riding.

It was put in as a response to all those shoppers who jaywalk to their cars on the other side of Masonic.

Click to expand

People still jaywalk of course, owing to the ease of parking on the northbound side of Masonic and the difficulty encountered trying to park in the TJ’s lot. (There’s a lot of history here on this example of bad planning.)

Did I call for this sign? Yes I did. So it’s good that it’s there now. It wasn’t there a couple of years ago, so good on you, SFGov.

But can SFGov and TJ’s do more? Sure. Hey, why don’t the Powers That Be take the opportunity revisit this whole situation before others kill themselves?

Right? I mean I’m not talking politically, ’cause the politics part of getting a new gro sto here is already done. But, you know, morally.

Just asking.

Moving on…

Now here’s an example of people actually taking the several minutes required to get back to their cars by walking down to Geary and waiting for the four-way signal.

This gal here broke from her shopping group to jaywalk while her friends did things the legal way.

(Until this, I’ve never noticed a person not jaywalking,)

So here she is, sitting pretty whilst waiting for her friends, exulting in her ability to not get hit by a car on this occasion: